Instructions for Compiling a Reading Book for Workers and Peasants

Written:December 1918Published:First published in June 1, 1936 inPravdaNo. 149.

      Printed from the typewritten copy.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      2nd English Edition,

      Progress Publishers,1971,

      Moscow,Volume 42,

      page122a.Translated:Bernard IsaacsTranscription\Markup:D. WaltersPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Assignment:a reading book for workers and peasants to be
compiled within a fortnight.

Thebook to consist of separate, complete, independent leaflets of two
to four printed pages.

Wordingmust be very popular, designed for the ignorant peasant. Number
of leaflets from 50 to 200; for the first issue -50.

Subjects:organisation of Soviet power, its home and foreign
policies. For example: What is Soviet power? How to run the country. The
law on land. The economic councils. Nationalisation of the
factories. Labour discipline. Imperialism. The imperialist war. Secret
treaties. How we offered peace. What we are fighting for now. What is
communism? Separation of the church from the state. And so on.

Goodold texts can and should be used, and old articles rewritten.

Thereading book should provide material for public readings and home
reading, for reprinting of separate texts and for translation (with slight
additions) into other languages.